Has the ruling Trinamul Congress decided to keep Kunal Ghosh in good humour, now that he's been removed as one of the state secretaries and from the list of the party's star campaigners?

It would appear so. On Saturday, he, and state education minister Bratya Basu acting as intermediary, met the party’s leader in the Rajya Sabha, Derek O’Brien. But, neither Ghosh nor Basu would come clear on what transpired at the meeting.

At the end of the hour-long meeting, Ghosh appeared to be in good humour. "I am in Trinamul and I will remain there. Whether I am holding a post or not is irrelevant,” Ghosh said after the meeting with O’Brien, whom he had addressed mockingly as “quiz master” a few days ago after being told he was being relieved of his official position in the party.

Ghosh said he had not received any official communication from the party on his removal. “I came to meet our leader with another leader, a state minister and friend. I don’t want to comment on what was discussed," he said.

But Ghosh did not deny "some discussions" have taken place. “Trust, love and relations are very important. My party also trusts me,” he said.

Basu said he was not aware of any problems between Ghosh and the Trinamul.

Within the Trinamul, Ghosh is known as a key loyalist of party general secretary Abhishek Banerjee. Most in Trinamul circles feel that Ghosh is acting on his behalf with reference to his derisive comments on the party's old guard.

One of the issues that Ghosh has been very vocal about since he was removed as the state secretary on May 1 has the teachers’ recruitment scam. After a division bench of the Calcutta High Court pulled up the state government over the creation of supernumerary posts to justify the appointment of candidates who had used unfair means to secure the jobs, the Mamata Banerjee government has been at unease.

And so is Basu, the state education minister. Though the high court had ordered a CBI probe into the creation of the supernumerary posts to regularise the "illegal" appointments of teaching and non-teaching staff and instructed the agency to interrogate all officials involved in the decision, the Supreme Court has given a stay on the CBI probe. That however is just a temporary relief for the Mamata Banerjee government in this election season.

Ghosh had said in an interview to Bengali news channel ABP Ananda, that the Trinamul leadership was aware of the money raised through the teachers’ recruitment scam well before the 2021 elections. Ghosh has refused to clarify who he meant by leadership.

Ghosh is possibly the only Trinamul leader who has survived in the party even after repeatedly deriding the chief minister publicly.

“He is one person who had unlimited access to the chief minister at one point of time. We don’t know what his bargaining chips are but it seems that he will be in (the party) for some more time,” said a Trinamul leader.